ING Bank Turkey dismisses 157 workers on the first day of 2018

ING Bank, a global financial institution of Dutch origin, is relentless in its anti-labour policies, as it dismissed 157 workers on the first day of 2018. Although the dismissals are mostly concentrated in branch banks, they do also include workers in the Head Office, operations, and information technology departments.

Bank workers found out about their dismissals via a list of all dismissals mistakenly sent to all employees. In the previous collective redundancy, ING Bank authorities had shut down the computers of the workers.

Pınar Abay, the General Manager of the Bank, had evaluated 2017 as "a year in which economic growth and recovery has been rapid," and praised the increase in profitability of the banking sector.

Abay's full support to 'the 2023 vision' of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) shows that the capitalists in the banking sector are satisfied with profitability and growth. Under these circumstances, there are widespread interpretations that the collective redundancy of the workers of ING Bank and a tendency to cheapen their labour force is what led to "increasing profits per employee" and "deepening labour exploitation".

ING Bank was already drawing controversy as its general manager, who previously on her birthday imposed a goal of 'higher performance', dismissed a bank worker who refused to accept this overtime pressure. The bank also dismissed many of its workers in the last days of 2017.